THE FORGET-ME-NOT. 125 



wished for towards her, exclaiming Vergiss-mein- 

 nichf) was framed in relation to some water-plant, 

 and not to any which grows in localities so dessicated 

 as those frequented by a great proportion of the 

 others, which I do not, therefore, include under the 

 head of forget-me-nots. I may here remark that 

 supposition of the emblematic signification of the 

 flower having arisen from the circumstance of the 

 banished Duke of Lancaster, afterwards Henry IV., 

 blending it with the initial letter of his watchword, 

 Souveigne vous de mois, as the badge of his ad- 

 herents, is a very remarkable instance of ingenious 

 adaptation of fact to circumstance ; a curious ex- 

 ample of the confusion of cause and effect. Even 

 did we not know the name to be of far more vene- 

 rable age, the idea would be shaken by its prevalence 

 through so many of the European languages, over 

 which a party badge could have no influence. I 

 should, however, remark that it would appear con- 

 fined to nations having the Teutonic element, a cir- 

 cumstance which in no way affects what has been 

 already said. That this meaning was attached to it 

 in England, so early as the year 1465, is shewn by 

 Mills in his " History of Chivalry/' for on the 1 7th 

 of April, in that year when a joust was held, in 

 which Lord Scales, the brother of the queen, took 

 part, the fair ladies of her court presented to that 

 favoured knight a collar of gold, enamelled with 

 "forget-me-nots." 



The botanical term myosotis is not unapt, signify- 

 ing, as it does, mouse's, or rat's, ear ; hence our Eng- 

 lish name of mouse-ear, the Italian orecchio di topo, 



